I modeled and abandon track.
Actually, we have spent so much time traveling this summer that the outdoor railroad is showing serious signs of neglect. This weekend promises to change that as my wife and I are planning to spend most of the long weekend working around the trains.
On the indoor layout very little has been accomplished. Other than running trains for visiting grandchildren and great-grandchildren, I have done nothing with the indoor layout.
Tom
Life is simple - eat, drink, play with trains!
Go Big Red!
PA&ERR "If you think you are doing something stupid, you're probably right!"
Didn't do much.
Facing a furnace replacement and a new roof we didn't go anywhere but to Schenectady for a few days for My Other Half's work training. Whoopie!
We also went to a market in Amish country here. Our big two days of "outtings" We were going to go to Steamtown for Train fest 2011 on labor day wekend, but I am not feeeling well so we may not go. That would be it for "vacations".
I also sarted dismantling my old small layout that I want to expand, but no funds at all for the hobby this year means I cant.
So I didn't do much.
Whoopie!
-G .
Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.
HO and N Scale.
After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.
There's never time to do it right, but always time to do it over.....
What did I do this summer?
Well, aside from the fact that we did not have much of a summer in my neck of the woods ( too cold, too wet), I was able to return to the active part of our hobby. I started to build my Japanese prototype mini-modular layout and was able to finish 4 modules. Right now I am working on my 5th module, a station module.
Not a bad achievement in just a few month ...
What did I do this summer? This pretty much sums it up:
watch?v=NtlpUcMFspk
- James
“Wasted” a summer! Nothing on my layout. Wrote 3 1/3 drafts of my master’s history thesis proposal. And at least four "Philoso0phy Friday" posts. Spent $$$$ getting a house ready to sell after deciding I couldn’t afford my renters. Train note: I had to do underlayment for carpet in one room after contractor “finished,” discovered that 4x4 sheets about ¼ thick are readily available at build-it-yourself stores. Gives me idea to experiment with designs for N layout on 4x4 sheet turned 45degrees to make a board 5 ½ feet end to end. Just a little different geometry.
In June, I designed an N layout based on the Santa Fe in Ottawa, Kansas a modeler I encountered online. I wrote a long article on another board about the layout design and how it would work with the prototype.
Visited wife’s grandson and granddaughter in Saint Charles, Missouri. I visited the local history society archive and looked at Sanborn’s maps of the tracks around the American Car and Foundry plant as it was in 1880s and 1950s.
This is the St Charles archive building. Modelworthy?
Also visited Philadelphia to see my wife’s other granddaughter. Rode the rapid transit and the regional rail, visited a hobby shop and –by accident- an abandoned model train factory.
This was a freight track along Schuyllkill River but didn’t see any freight trains on it.
Entirely by accident, discovered an abandoned tunnel behind the Rodin Museum. Track used to run to the Reading Terminal in the middle of downtown Phillie.
After I got back, I became addicted to "Show Me Something." And just for fun, I sketched a Philadelphia Museum of Art LAYOUT DESIGN ELEMENT featuring a background of the “Rocky” stairs.
I will write this up in a few days. Give Phillie a chance to settle down from then storm before I stir things up again.
It's funny you should ask. I don't really remember what I did! I know I built a few building kits, installed my main street and ran some trains. I played with trains quite a bit but dang if I can't remember what I did for most the summer! I must be getting old.
Bill,
It was a long, hard, tough summer. I worked a lot of extra hours on the job because of health problems with coworkers. My 26 years old daughter has been in and out of Emergency Rooms and hospitals for the past 3 years and worse the last 6 months. That being said, I worked on the mountain and tunnels near the door of the layout room. The mountain reaches to about 6 inches below the ceiling. The mountain has a double track mainline (minimum radius 42 inches) doing a 180 degree turn on a 1.5% grade. I used hot glue and cardboard for the lattice work. Then applied rock castings followed by scultpamold. Painted that with brown latex paint. Then ground cover and about 250 trees. I still need to finish the scenery around the tunnel portal, but at least I made some progress. Once, that scenery is complete, I will post a few photos.
Thank goodness for model railroading. It helps unload some of the pressures of life.
Craig North Carolina
Nice topic Bill.
Well I lost my job back in May ( I think I have mentioned this here before ) and I will continue to get my severance pay until mid October before having to file for unemployment If I havent found a job yet.
I have been working since I was 16 and have only had about 6 weeks vacation in that entire span ( im now 29 ) and the one thing that I wanted to do this summer was relax. I have got the railroad back out again and have done a ton of yard work in between the heat. And in between that I just relaxed and went for some nice walks and also played alot of Playstation,lol and also did alot of reading, caught up on some books.
The weather here is been cool for the last couple days and you can really feel Fall in the air but we are supposed to be getting some more warm weather at the end of the week so I should enjoy it well I can.
- Jeremy
Lee - you get the award thus far for the most dramatic expansion for the summer. Installing an operational 10-track yard (with some ground cover, yet) is no small feat. I will take a look at your web site. I never made it up to chase the WM, although I had fun visiting the Maryland Midland!
vsmith - Looks neat. I have 1:20.3 in the garden. I am intreagued by micro-layout design and have one abuilding in my head. I had some of that MicroTrains HOn30 stuff back in the 1960s and have purchased one of the re-issued diesels (hope to get the 0-4-0 this fall). I am visualizing a micro layout using a side-rod 45-ton on the HO standard gauge, the narrow gauge hauling limestone and coal at different levels on auto-operation, and perhaps a transfer-table and sector plate to add variety on the HO.
Darrell - Congratulations on the inventory completion. I spent much of last winter scanning train pictures into the computer rather than working on the layout. Now if I have to "bail" from the coast due to a hurricane those images should survive. The computer program awaits, and I know that I should make an inventory, especially of the railroad book library.
So many projects, and summers can just fly by...
Bill
I re-leveled my shed! I know, I should have prepped the ground better BEFORE I got the shed, but that didn't happen. Three of the four corners had sunk into the ground, the worst more than 4"! Dug out that corner and poured a concrete pier. Did the second corner the same way. The third corner still has concrete patio blocks for support and I may decide to excavate that corner and pour a pier. Haven't decided if I want to mess with the 4th corner. It seems stable.
In the meantime, I compiled an inventory of my rolling stock, passenger cars and locomotives. That may have been a mistake. I wanted the inventory, but I didn't realize how much STUFF I had! After I did the initial inventory in an Excel spreadsheet, I sorted them to locate the duplicates. (Gee, don't you just hate buying something you already had but had forgotten you had it?) The duplicates, and anything that didn't fit my transition-era layout theme, were sold on e-Bay.
Once the inventory was done and culled, I started on coupler conversions of rolling stock and passenger cars, a project that has been waiting for far longer than I'd care to admit. I had a good supply of couplers and but I stilll ended up buying more.
Loco conversions came next. Once more, plenty of conversion kits on hand, but still needed more. I also learned that there are many steam locomotives for which there is NO conversion kit available. Principal among them are Minitrix's 2-10-0 and Bachmann's 4-8-4. Now you would think that after 30 or 40 YEARS in production that a conversion would be available, but if you thought that way, you'd be wrong!
All in all, it's been an interesting summer and I feel I've made significant progress. A complete inventory and all Micro Trains coupler-equipped equipment AND a LEVEL SHED!!
I'm a happy camper.
At least until I work up the courage to start the decoder installations......................! I suspect that some of my older locos will be up for sale after I determine that they're too hard to convert to DCC!
Darrell, quiet...for now
What I did this summer? Started a new large scale indoor layout:
Downsized my portable layout and restarted my 2'x2' large scale micro pizza:
Have fun with your trains
The only thing I've done, other than purchase more rolling stock & locomotives it practice weathering on a few cars
Gordon
Brought to you by the letters C.P.R. as well as D&H!
K1a - all the way
I just ran some trains...
My little 4x10' HO layout may be small, and I may not have enough money to make it a masterpiece, but that doesn't make me any less of a modeler!
Started wiring and drywalling the new model railway room. 50% completed as of this evening.
Cheers
Roger T.
Home of the late Great Eastern Railway see: - http://www.greateasternrailway.com
For more photos of the late GER see: - http://s94.photobucket.com/albums/l99/rogertra/Great_Eastern/
Spent some quality time with the WM right of way near Hancock, Maryland...
I also went from this...
to this...
Still a couple weeks left to do a few more fun things.
Lee
Route of the Alpha Jets www.wmrywesternlines.net
Went somewhere completely different, and contemplated hornby tank engines.
Go here for my rail shots! http://www.railpictures.net/showphotos.php?userid=9296
Building the CPR Kootenay division in N scale, blog here: http://kootenaymodelrailway.wordpress.com/
Finished the benchwork and expect to start putting the roadbed and track down this week.
Enjoy
Paul
Vehicles look good!
Much of the time I wished I was in the cool basement train room while I was out working in the overly warm fields. Usually too pooped to do much after a day in the sun. Dream layout would be in an upstairs room, might get warm. Wonder if I should concider changing planned location, though not as big or as well designed?
Did try making some connifer trees following some of the suggestions found here on the forums. A few ended up in the trash, some came out very nicely and the majority weren't too bad and will do just fine when installed on the layout.
Also kept the sedum garden weeded for winter tree projects. Mowed a bunch of potential trees (golden rod) down when I bush hogged the pastures, but still have plenty if you need some.
With bull in a china shop grandchildren headed home and back to school, I will be more likely to go down there and work on things. Have a plan to install a plexiglas guard around the layout, then they will be able to run trains with little danger of the train ending up plunging to the floor. Also, the reach over will help protect trees, etc. that they have a tendency to pull foliage off from.
Have fun,
Richard
I installed a lot of track and wiring. Nothing too photogenic to share, but it sure moved the layout along.
Rob Spangler
Labor Day weekend is upon us. Most of the public schools are back in session and High School football is back on Friday nights. The old standard upon returning to school was to write an essay on "What I did this summer".
My answer is: As many modelers do, I have stockpiled quite a few kits over the years. The heat this summer limited my outdoor work to the morning. I'm not getting any younger, and I thought that perhaps I should work on some of those detailed kits before the eyes and the hand jitters get any worse. So, I assembled eight vehicle kits shown here:
Left to right these are: A 1914 Diamond T truck (Woodland Scenics); a 1914 Model T Touring (Jordan); a 1911 Model T Delivery truck (Jordan); a 1913 Model T Fire Truck (Jordan); a Buckboard Wagon (Rustic Rails) and an Open Wagon (Rustic Rails). Up on the loading dock are two Model T Center Door cars, also from Jordan.
So, What did YOU do this summer?